If you were hoping that new NBA Commissioner Adam Silver was going to bring the thunder tonight in his press conference regarding TMZ’s revealing audio that paints quite the racist picture of Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling, you were undoubtedly disappointed. While Sterling has already had portraits painted of his alleged racism over the years, this latest revelation has a lot of people screaming for the controversial owner’s head, and Silver simply stated that the NBA will investigate and Sterling will not attend tomorrow’s Clippers playoff game.

Meanwhile, in the court of public opinion, Sterling is the King of A-holes to just about everyone except for the people who either believe him that the phone conversation that TMZ released was doctored, or those who think that the fact that the audio was obtained illegally somehow forgives the fact that Sterling is allegedly outright and despicably racist. We’ve already heard from Magic Johnson and Snoop Dogg, among others, so let’s check in with the self-anointed King of the NBA, LeBron James, to see what the best player on the planet thinks about Sterling.

What are your thoughts on Donald Sterling’s comments?

“If the reports are true, it’s unacceptable. It’s unacceptable in our league. It doesn’t matter if you’re white, black, Hispanic, whatever, all across the races. It’s unacceptable and as a commissioner in our league, they have to make a stand, and they have to be very aggressive with it. I don’t know what it’s going to be, but you just can’t have that in our league. We’re the model citizens of all sports around the world and because we’re the most recognizable, I mean, it figures. You see us all the time, you see our logos, you see our players, and for an owner to come out and say the things that he said, it’s very disrespectful, it’s very appalling and one of my best friends and dear friends plays on his team in Chris Paul and I haven’t had an opportunity to talk to him but I can only imagine what’s going through his head.”

How difficult would it be to play with that hanging over…

“I don’t know. I kind of waivered back and forth whether I would actually sit out. If our owner would come out and say the things that he said, I would really have to sit down with my teammates, talk to my family because at the end of the day, our family, and our teammates are way more important than that. Basketball is huge, obviously the playoffs have been unbelievable, and I hate the fact that something like this has to come out when the playoffs have been unbelievable and the game of basketball continues to grow, but there is no room for Donald Sterling in our league. There is no room for him.”

Does it make you angry?

“I’m not angry. Just disappointed more than anything. There is only 30 owners and 400-plus of us. For a player, I just think…I put my…I can only imagine if a player came out and said something of that stature what would happen to us as players. So, I believe in Adam [Silver], I believe in the NBA and they have to do something and do something very fast and quickly before this really gets out of hand. Like I said, there is no room for Donald Sterling in our league, man. There it is.” (Via the Miami Herald Heat Check Blog)

Obviously, there’s going to be so much more developing from this story over the next few days, weeks and probably months – unless someone important says something even dumber, which we never rule out anymore – so just buckle and prepare for this sh*t show to explode when Stephen A. Smith and Skip Bayless get their hands on it come Monday.

question is how many of those “owned” black guys will play for their racist “owner”, or will they as a team stand on principal, sacrifice for the sake of a higher purpose, a more important goal, and simply walk off the court until sterling is gone. stay tuned.

“There is only 30 owners”. He may be full of hate, but he’s got the edu-ma-cation and the bankroll Bron. In 10 years you’ll be out, and he’ll still be a rich owner. (But he’s wrong if these comments are true)

Gimpy, there have been 48 NBA players arrested in the last 3 years. In 2002, 178 players in the league that year had been arrested at one point in their lives, most for violent crimes, many against women

What are you talking about? Have you ever read, oh I don’t know HISTORY!??! You can do anything, you can break laws just because you don’t like someone. Get enough people in Southern California pissed off and what do you think the LAPD is going to do? Nothing, just like they didn’t to Cliven Bundy.

If we wanted to we could drag this guy behind a pickup truck through the streets of LA allowing him to gather upon his person as many needles as possible for a high score. Then when all his limbs have been shaken off, burn the torso on top of the Staples center.

04.27.14 at 11:53 pm

thedinnerclubformen

We’re talking about something this guy said at the moment. Now, if they open an investigation and find he’s actively discriminating against minorities in the workplace then I’m all for civil action. But it’s not like we have some new evidence that he’s segregating the showers or paying less to minority employees. He’s a piece of shit racist. But this is something he said and as far as I know you’re allowed to say anything you want in the privacy of your own home no matter how ignorant and apparently batshit it sounds. @Yogi

If you don’t want to read it, basically it’s not entirely clear that Sterling is even the worst person who owns an NBA team. Seriously. What I love about his list of owners is that it doesn’t even include trust-fund baby Jim Buss, paranoid disphit James Dolan or run of the mill idiot Glen Taylor, the only NBA owner the league has ever actually bitch-slapped (for signing Joe Smith to an illegal contract and being OBVIOUS about something every other team was already doing at the time).